This blog on Texas education contains posts on accountability, testing, college readiness, dropouts, bilingual education, immigration, school finance, race, class, and gender issues with additional focus at the national level.

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Wednesday, May 02, 2012

Texas Education Commissioner Robert Scott Stepping Down

Texas Education Agency Commissioner Robert Scott is leaving
the post Gov. Rick Perry
appointed him to in 2007.

When Scott steps down on July 2 from the agency that
oversees the public education of Texas' nearly 5 million students, he will
be the longest-serving education commissioner of the past two decades.

Scott said in a statement that it had been a
"privilege" to serve at the agency and noted that he began his career
there in 1994 — when his son was one and his daughter was 3 months old — and
they have both now gone on to graduate from Texas public schools.

"It's time," he said.

Texas was often at the center of national conversations on
education matters during his tenure — skirmishing with the Obama administration
over Race to the Top and other federal policy and making deep reductions to
public education funding. More recently, Scott drew fire over his remarks
suggesting Texas needed to reform how it uses standardized testing to hold
schools accountable.

During the past legislative session when the state cut
public schools by more than $5 billion, Scott often found himself having to
both reassure
educators that they would be able to make do with fewer
resources and ask lawmakers for more funding. Asking what parts of the education
budget should be funded, he once told senators during a
hearing, was akin to asking "a guy on the operating table
whether wants his heart or his lungs back." Texas schools have lost more
than 25,000 employees in the year since lawmakers slashed the education budget
— and to absorb its
own state budget cuts the TEA has dropped a third of its
staff.

In January, Scott made waves with a forceful speech at an
annual gathering of school administrators in Austin that added fuel to a
national conversation on standardized testing — and to speculation that he
might soon be leaving his post. He said student testing in the state had
become a “perversion of its original intent” and that he looked forward to
“reeling it back” in the future. While he said that testing has its place in
keeping schools accountable, he called for an accountability system that
measured “every other day of a school’s life besides testing day.” (Here is
a full version of his remarks.)

Though the speech marked his strongest comments on the
subject to date, it was not the first time Scott found himself navigating a
controversy on how standardized exam scores factor into state accountability
ratings. Last May, the agency discontinued
the use of a mechanism in the ratings called the "Texas Projection
Measure," which critics said artificially inflated students' test scores
by inaccurately taking into account their future performance. The move came
after a year of outcry from lawmakers and a unanimous vote against the
measure on the House floor.

Under Scott's watch, Texas also became one of the first
states to refuse federal Race to the Top funding, which he said at the time
would have imposed too many burdens on schools, including forcing them to
adhere to national common core curriculum standards.

Before his appointment, Scott served as TEA's acting
commissioner twice and served four years as chief deputy commissioner, managing
daily TEA operations. He previously served as senior policy adviser
to Perry and is credited with helping pass and implement the Texas High School
Initiative in 2003.

In a press release, Perry praised Scott's performance at the agency.

"Robert’s experience and dedication have left a lasting
imprint on our state’s education system and countless Texas children, ensuring
a top-notch education for our students and their preparation for success in and
out of school," he said. "I’m thankful for his service and wish him
all the best in the future.”